Category: When…and Why

Tough and Sweet to the tooth

“To hold onto something with a desperate grip is not the way to die. Death is a painful process, and restoratives offered to the dying wretch bound to his wheel only prolong his agony. There are times when the thing to do is simply to die. I am thinking, of course, of dying to the self. We clutch so tenaciously to our rights, hopes, ambitions, something to which God has perhaps said a plain no. If would-be comforters offer us consolation and sympathy, if they assist us to strengthen our grasp when it should be loosened, they do not love us as God loves us. The way into life is death, and if we refuse it we are refusing Him who showed us that way and no other. The love which is strong as death is not only willing to save the beloved, it is willing to seem, if necessary, pitiless, insensitive, unloving, if that is what will help the beloved to die–that is, to be released from the bondage of self, which is death, and thus enter the gateway of life.

Archbishop Fenelon wrote to the countess of Montberon, ‘You want to die, but to die without any pain…. You must give all or nothing when God asks it. If you have not the courage to give at least let Him take.’”

And so the mystery of life through death lives on with a passing over. It is a new day, and I have felt more peace with the morning than usual mornings. It is finished, and the sun rises again in the East with the song, “How Deep the Father’s Love for Us” playing through my tired mind. Let it play. 

Yesterday, I made Tsoureki: Greek Easter bread. Traditional Easter breads carry the makers mark of symbolic sweetness and heartiness. Rich, eggy, yeasty. Like other festival breads,  they might be celebrated by coating bite for bite in honey before meeting the lips. Just a week ago I was reading about the opposite – Passover bread – unleavened, empty, disheartened, and eaten with bitter herbs.  Today, the sweetness is good enough. It is enough. It is good.

For the past few weeks I’ve been communally re-visiting our Bible’s “children’s stories.” Adam, Eve, Moses, Noah, Abraham, Jonah…you know them – the big guys. After catching a glimpse of The Passion movie in this Sunday’s service, foreshadowed by a procession of the “big” guys preparing the way of the Lord, “Live On,” seems to be the one thing written over and over and over. This is not your day to stop, this is not the end of the story. Get up and walk. Enter the land I have prepared for you. Live on.

Elisabeth’s devotion today is harder to swallow, but reminds me of this morning’s peace. Death has been swallowed. It’s day one of a new year of life going on after death. Taste and see the good.

When I asked Joseph how he found out about S.O.U.L Church, he told me he followed his nose. “I could smell the food…” he followed up with an honest chuckle.

Another new acquaintance, Dan, told me, “Well, you really can’t miss the music!”

I learned about S.O.U.L’s  ministry through Holy Yoga (*the odds*), practicing one Saturday morning with Pastor Leon’s wife, Jennifer. Yesterday, I had the pleasure of getting to participate for the first time. Dan and Joseph are spot on, you can’t miss the sounds and smells radiating from this small, open lot beneath the crossroads, downtown. Hands and feet numb on this Sunday morning, hugs abundant, eyes and ears eagerly opened, heart – crazy full. Hundreds of friends gathered to celebrate a birthday, a marriage, new life, new testimonies, peace beyond understanding, a hot breakfast, worship, dancing and singing with abandon (in Jesus’ name). If you’re ever in the area on a Sunday morning, I encourage you to get involved. Maybe you’ve been looking for this too? I’ll provide an early bird wake up call and we’ll go together!

Get the details, and more info that I can provide on S.O.U.L. here >>

Thoughtful Little Caterpillar

Francis Chan writes in Forgotton God,

“Have you ever wondered what caterpillars think?”

I wrote that quote down immediately, for one, because it was something so off the wall, so me, that I had to give it my appreciative shout-out, but also for the sheer lightness and innocence it brought to the page weighted with the topic of the Holy Spirit. (And isn’t a simple caterpillar just as important work of the Spirit as a leaf turning from green to red, or as the cosmic phenomenon of darkness turning into light?)

So, what do caterpillars think?

What do they know of the past and future but the present, unexplainable mystery of change? From the cocoon of transformation, they emerge, unpredictably, a new creature: something different than ever before.

[With wings that weren’t there before].

I feel like a very small thing in a Big World. I feel like a transformation – a work in progress.

A good thing.

Something alive, afterall – and with wings that weren’t there before.